Some of What Remains
by ijs1337
Summary: Not everyone left Earth when BnL went with the strategy of an extended vacation; some stayed behind, isolated on one side of the planet. They endured everything from evolution to an alien invasion. Having come to the other side of the planet, pursued by what's left of their enemies, they see humanity return. Now the question is: what happens when humanity (and robots) meets them?
1. Chapter 1

_Guardian Martius Walker, June 23__rd__, 2805_

_Seven hundred years. It's been seven hundred years since most of them left. Since we finally did it. Turned the planet into a giant toxic ball of waste and garbage. Since the corporate planet-wide government figured that sending everyone into space was the best way for humanity to survive._

_Some of us disagreed. Some of us stayed behind. We migrated from all over the world to a few continents on the Eastern side of the planet, and from there, we moved to what used to be Australia. Was one of the relatively cleanest places, so the story goes, cause it was still somehow packed with enough incredibly dangerous animals that no-one wanted to use it as a dumping ground, whatever the hazard pay. _

_We lived there for a while, scraping out an existence, plumbing the depths of nearby continents when what was left started running out. We had colonies, for lack of a better term, in Africa, Russia, China, and we were pushing into Europe from the Middle East. _

_That was about three hundred years ago. That's around the time when everything went wrong. When the Drocal came._

_We never learned exactly where they came from. All we know for sure is that they came across our planet and decided to take it for themselves. Maybe there were still some resources buried beneath the ground they could have used; maybe to them, Earth was a good fixer-upper and they needed a place to stay. We didn't know why when they attacked us, and we still don't. What we do know is that we went to war with them. And we lost our half of the planet in the process._

_We won, in the end. Captured one of their ships, flew it into the middle of their fleet and blew the ship's jump core. We didn't get them all; a lot of the soldiers that were down here when we made our ship-bomb play are still here. Fewer in numbers, of course, but they're still on the planet. We fought them off for about ten years after we won while we put together a way to get out of the plasma haze most of the Eastern side of the world had been reduced to by the time all of the bombing and shooting was over._

_We made it to what used to be America's East Coast about a hundred years ago. We've only managed to set up one major settlement in the time since we landed. One settlement, a few miles of land, barely half a million people. We used to have almost thirty cities, over half a billion people. That's what the Drocal took from us. They also hung onto our coattails somewhat. Most of them are still on the Eastern half, with the utter wasteland they helped add to. Some of them followed us. That's why people like me exist._

_I'm a Guardian. I protect and serve the last populated non-Drocal settlement on planet Earth. I defend its borders, scavenge and explore the places around us as needed for supplies and potential sites for expansion. It's my job, and the job of a few hundred men and women, to protect what remains and make sure it has something to build a future with._

_Not a future for humanity. Not quite. I think I ought to clarify that. Turns out that seven hundred years with a vastly reduced gene pool and a toxic, garbage-covered planet send evolution into overdrive. Well, overdrive might be the wrong word. If it were in overdrive, we'd probably have lizard heads or something crazy like that. That's not to say we haven't changed from what we were. Because we certainly have. We're tougher and stronger by a margin, and on average live a few decades longer than what we assume the human standards are. Or were. Also, turns out breathing through an air filter and spending most of your life in an environmentally sealed suit for centuries does wonders for the circulatory system. Who knew? There's also a slight issue of appearance. Most of us are either incredibly pale or grey-skinned, with a few who have more human-looking tones that are just a bit tinted one way or the other. We've become something that isn't quite human anymore, but it's not so different that we're something totally new. We're more like a sub-species, I guess. _

_Guardians work in small groups, called Fire Teams. The largest Team is ten Guardians, Fire Team Fifty. I lead Fire Team Nine, commanding two other Guardians. Luco and Kahlee. We get our…_

_Man. I just stopped and read what I've written. It's like some opening expository monologue in a story. A lot of my journal entries are like that, actually. I need to stop doing that. _


	2. Chapter 2

They were coming in for rendezvous off of separate patrols of three different sectors. None of them liked it when they had to split up; they were supposed to be a team, supposed to work together. They did their best work together. So it annoyed and befuddled them to no end why Control would always send them off on their own before meet-ups somewhere else for scouting duties. Walker sighed, and checked his rifle. Or at least tried to. Seven-Nine, pilot of his strike craft did her best to keep the rides smooth, but there was only so much even someone of her skills could do when flying over skyscrapers and towers of trash-cubes.

"Coming up on the drop zone, Marty. Might wanna get ready." Her voice rang over the com.

He stood up and walked to the hatch as it slowly ground open.

"Want me to slow down?" Her tone full of mirth.

"You'd do that?" Walker asked. Most strike-craft-drops involved leaping out of the ship while it was in motion, a tactic carried over from the days of the war.

"Nah. Just thought I'd ask anyway."

Walker smirked beneath his helmet and mask. "In that case, no. Don't feel the need to stop." Her laughter rang over the com as she swung the ship in a sharp turn.

Walker leapt over the edge of the hatch, dropping onto a rooftop. He got up from his hunched position just in time to see Seven-Nine streak away into the yellow sky.

* * *

Walker was slouching on a rotting park bench, surrounded by brown grass, rifle held casually in the nook of his right arm when he heard a rustling. He was off the bench and aiming at the source of the sound seconds later.

"Go Big Horns." A voice rang out.

Walker smiled and lowered his rifle. Luco's check-in phrase for that week.

"What is it with you and schools?" He said, walking up to the man coming out from behind the husk of a tree to grab his hand and slap him on the shoulder. "You've never even been to college."

"Yeah, well that's just cause there aren't any around anymore. If there were, you can bet I'd be there." He took on a comical stance of affront as Walker started laughing. "Seriously. I'd study something worthwhile. Old Earth Literature, maybe." Even Luco couldn't keep up his serious tone at that and what he tried to say next devolved into unintelligible laughter.

"Bang, bang." An amused female voice rang out from behind them. "You're both dead. Cause you're both idiots."

Kahlee strode up and tossed a tablet to Walker.

"Yeah, but we're your idiots." Luco said, recovering from his fit of laughter.

"Damn straight you are." Kahlee agreed, poking him in the chest slightly.

"Alright, enough flirting you two. Control's coming online." Walker interrupted.

"Speaking of flirting." Luco whispered under his breath.

"Shut up." Walker shot back in good nature.

The display of the tablet in his hand brightened, and a video feed blossomed on the screen, displaying a smiling, dark-haired woman. A link-up bar popped up in the corner of Walker's HUD.

"Fire Team Nine, this is Control. How are you all doing?" The woman asked brightly.

"Oh, you know us, Val," Walker said, looking around at the empty buildings, paper-covered streets, and towers of trash cubes. "Another day in paradise."

Her smile widened at Walker's joke. "Well, try and stay the course Mart. Just in case any of you happened to doze off during this morning's briefing, you're on scout duty till nightfall. Head out beyond the sector boundaries, see what you can find."

"Roger that."

"Also, try and be careful." Valerie added. More a personal plea to Martius, for her benefit.

"I always am." Walker assured her.

"No you're not." She replied.

"You're right. I've gotta work on that."

* * *

They were hiding from a storm in the meat locker of a dilapidated supermarket beyond the sector boundaries. Though, looking at the place, Walker felt that "super" was too small a word to describe the vastness of the building. "Ultra" might be better. "Ultramarket." Had a good ring to it.

"Hey Walker."

"What is it Luco?"

"Got an issue here."

"Mission critical?"

"Nope. Personnel status issue, potentially affecting morale."

Walker sighed. "Lay it on me, Luco. What's your status?"

"Status is chafed."

"Chafed?" Kahlee cut in.

"Yep. Chafed. Local airborne hostiles have infiltrated the militarized sector designated as 'My Pants.'"

Kahlee was shaking with laughter at that. "Shut up." She was quite for a few minutes, and looked contemplative. "You think the Drocs can't our food?"

"What?" Luco asked incredulously.

"I'm serious. Maybe they can't eat our food or drink our water cause there's some weird, tiny genetic difference between us and them. Like our proteins or enzymes or something are different, so if we tried to eat the other's food, we'd hack our guts up and choke to death."

Luco thought about it for a second.

"No way."

* * *

Walker gazed at a bolted door that lead somewhere underground. Bolted, key-code-locked, and probably DNA-locked too. He figured it was one of those "end-of-the-world-prep" bunkers, though, from what he had seen of the lifestyle of humanity before they left, he couldn't figure why anyone would need a doomsday bunker.

"Doomsday bunker?" He said, thinking out loud.

"Maybe," Luco added, coming up behind him. "Or maybe it's a personal vault."

"With a bunch of motion-sensitive Defender bots inside?" Kahlee added playfully.

Luco sighed. "Seriously, how long are we going to keep bringing that up?"

"Until it stops being funny."

"That's hurtful. You are trivializing my trauma, Kahlee. I nearly died, and-"

"Luco, just open the door. We'll protect you from any killer robots that may or may not be hiding inside." Walker cut in.

"Seriously. Not funny. I nearly lost my beautiful face. And my torso." Luco grumbled as he approached the door. After several minutes of plasma-cutting and hacking, Walker heard the door locks click open. Luco reached out, pulled the door open and quickly dove behind the door as though he expected a giant chrome death-machine to be waiting for him on the threshold.

Walker stepped inside, looked around fairly small metal room covered in shelves of inexpirable food and started laughing.

"Motherload!" He cried happily. Luco finally got up the courage to come out from behind the door, and eagerly looked over what they found. Enough to keep a whole section of the Settlement fed for a month or more. It was a great moment. A great feeling. Knowing that they'd all done something, found something they knew could help their people keep living. Luco scanned the shelves more closely and moved to make sure he saw what he thought he saw. He gave a delighted whoop when he was sure he was right.

"What is it?" Kahlee asked, curious.

"Snack cakes." Luco replied, turning the box to show her. Little frosted, crème-filled cakes in packages, patterned like some animal the box said was a zebra. Kahlee started laughing.

"What's so funny?" Luco asked.

"You. We find a trove of food, and the most exciting bit for you is the couple boxes of snack cakes."

"A world without snack cakes is a world I want no part of, babe."

"Good thing none of us did anything more than pointing our guns in when you opened the door. Imagine having to live with the knowledge that you destroyed what might have been the last few boxes of snack cakes on Earth."

"Don't even joke about that."

* * *

They'd informed Control about the bunker, and continued on. Moving through towers of trash cubes and husks of old, dirt-covered buildings. Luco and Kahlee were in the middle of figuring out whether or not Kahlee's plasma launcher could completely destroy the old gas station signs when it happened. Something enormous dropped through the clouds and haze a couple miles outside the edge of the city. A ship that they'd seen the make of in hundreds of somehow-still-running holographic ads. A Buy-N-Large starliner.

**Now, I get that the elite team of crack hunter-gatherer-scavenger alien killers is not acting as serious as a team of that description should. But that's the point. I'm not out to "hard boil" WALL-E (there's a series called Extra Credits with an episode by that title (hard boil) that perfectly enumerates everything I don't want to do with my race of OCs)). I don't want to make something that is 100% seriousness and gunfights with aliens. There will be seriousness, and there will be gunfights with aliens, but there HAS to be more to than that, or this would be such the tonal opposite of WALL-E. Hence the flirting and the obsession with snack cakes. Also, can anyone guess what that alien food discussion is in reference to?**


	3. Chapter 3

"So. What do we do?" Kahlee asked in a question that was open for anyone to answer. The others just stood, looking at the massive starliner in the distance.

"Go take a look?" Walker offered uncertainly.

"Sounds good. Specially if they're secretly-" Luco started to say.

"If you say 'Drocs sneaking in in disguise' I will hit you." Walker said.

"What for?"

"Well, for one, where would the Drocs get a starliner? They're all stuck here, and any liners are so far off they'd have no way to get them. And you can bet that if they could build a ship, they wouldn't build one that looks like one from a race they don't even know about, just to sneak-attack us. They'd go…"

"Where?"

"I don't know. Home, maybe. But they wouldn't-"

"Yeah, well until I'm proven wrong, I'm assuming 'Droc Trap.'"

Walker sighed.

* * *

"So, what do they look like?" Luco asked Walker.

Walker, standing atop a trash-cube tower, was gazing through binoculars at the crowd of what he hoped where humans.

They'd put a little plant in the ground and were watering it with a Styrofoam drink cup.

"Fat." Walker admitted.

"Fat?" Luco asked incredulously.

"Yeah. Fat."

Luco held out his hand for the binoculars, and looked through them.

"Wow. They _are_ fat."

"Maybe it's not fat, exactly." Kahlee offered. "Maybe it's the seven-hundred years of microgravity and automated transport altering their bone mass."

Luco mulled her comment over before returning to his observations. "Nah, that's definitely fat."

"Why are you so convinced they're actually humans all of a sudden, Luco?" Walker asked as he pulled off his breathing mask.

"I don't know. Maybe Drocs wouldn't be clever enough to think that those poshy humans would get fat after seven-hundred years." Luco said, speculating.

"So they _are_ humans?" Walker pushed, taking a drought of purified water from a small container in his pack.

"I never said they were humans, just convincing fake ones."

"You really aren't going to let that conspiracy of yours go, are you?"

"Nope."

* * *

Night had fallen. Which meant Drocal scavengers would be out in force. No-one knew why they preferred to really mobilize when night fell; they'd never done so in the war, but it was habit adopted when they'd come across to the Western half of the world. Nightfall meant they had to head back to the Settlement.

Walker had other ideas.

"I think I'll stay here. Keep an extended watch, so to speak." He offered as Luco and Kahlee started packing up their gear.

"You're nuts," Luco said. "He's nuts, right Kahlee? Tell him he's nuts."

"It really isn't a very good idea," Kahlee began to say reluctantly. She tried her best to not take sides whenever Luco and Walker got in serious disagreements. "I mean, Drocs'll be out in force now, no saying they won't come up here-"

"Then I'll toss them off the side. I'll be fine, really. This is just-"

Luco had pulled out the tablet that connected to Command. He'd keyed in the pick-up code, and Valerie's face filled the screen.

"Good to hear from you-" She started to say.

"Yeah, you're gonna want to cut down on our extract fuel, Val. We're gonna be one short." Luco cut in.

Ordinarily, news like that was usually the kind that precluded Guardian funerals, but Luco's annoyed tone obviously made it clear that nothing had gone horribly wrong.

"What's happened?"

"Walker has got it into his head to stay out all night on a cube-tower, watching a bunch of probably-fake humans."

"Luco…" Walker started to say wearily.

"Put him on." Valerie said angrily.

"What?"

"Put. Him. On."

Her tone had Luco practically throwing the tablet at Walker.

"Remember when I told you to be careful?" She asked scathingly.

"Of course." Walker replied neutrally.

"Clearly not, because what you're saying you're going to do is the exact opposite of that."

"Valerie, I'll be fine, I swear. I just… I feel like I need to do this. You ever have that feeling? That there's something you need to do?"

Valerie's look grew slowly less death-inducing as she considered what he'd said.

"Why do you think I'm working here?" She finally said with a sigh.

"So, you won't tear my head off when I get back tomorrow?" Walker asked.

"I'll do one worse." Valerie said.

"What could… Oh come-" Walker began to protest as he realized exactly what she meant.

"You want to stay out of the Settlement overnight for a bunch of humans, fine. But you're not risking your life for nothing and getting off scot-free."

"Fine. So, what are we talking, two weeks?"

"At the least."

Walker sighed.

**Sorry this took so long, but my muse ran off. I had to hire a mute and his furry sidekick to track it down (another reference, for those who feel like it). Also, as to the length, well, varying chapter length is sort of a personal trademark, mostly because I end things where I feel it's appropriate for the given bit of story, rather than try and shoot for a specific word count and cover tons of things at once. Also, can't believe it's taken me three chapter to realize I was missing two very important message bits, but here they are. I do not own WALL-E; Please review and/or comment.**


	4. Chapter 4

Walker watched Kahlee and Luco work their way up the cube tower. The night had been fairly uneventful. He'd just made sure he used nothing powered, and slept in starts with a gun in easy reach. There were a few Drocal bodies dotting the ground at the base at of the tower as testament to the foresight of sleeping with a gun nearby.

When Luco saw him, he reached into one of the many pouches on his belt and handed a few ration cards to Kahlee.

"Betting that I would be alive?" Walker asked casually.

"Just how much of you would be missing." Luco responded, his tone giving away the smile that couldn't be seen beneath his helmet.

"And?" Walker posed, holding his arms wide.

"I figured you'd be missing a arm at the very least."

"I'd say I'm sorry to disappoint you, but then I'd need a lot of new parts." Walker turned, to look at the Axiom off in the distance. "I think I know what we do now."

"What?"

"We go say hello."

* * *

The approach to the ship took them past a decrepit highway, with a large BnL storage truck sitting at the broken edge. A truck that looked like something had been living in it. Coming down from the drop-off leading to the spaceport, Walker could distantly see a single spot of green, not far from the starliner.

Green. Walker could remember the last time he'd seen anything that was alive and not covered in dust, half-dead for any number of reasons, or trying to kill him. He knew no-one had seen any sort of plant life for centuries at least.

So where had the humans found one? Grown on the ship for recolonization, maybe? Walker didn't know. And he hoped to find out.

Nearly at the ship now, Walker saw a great deal of activity. Robots of all kinds were milling around, unsure of what to do with themselves. Ball-ish humans slowly stepped their way around, talking, some in the stages of what appeared to planning, some looking at and caring for the lone plant. Walker's eyes found a man in a white jumpsuit, a dress shirt slid over the suit and ancient naval hat atop the head. Clearly the captain.

"Alright. I think I just spotted the man in charge. Now, we need to-"

Walker didn't get the chance to finish. Luco had slung his rifle off his back and quickly strong-armed his way to the presumed captain.

"Son of a…" Walker said to himself, hurrying after Luco with Kahlee close behind.

* * *

Walker hadn't heard most of the conversation Luco had had with the captain, but what he could hear when he caught up didn't make him optimistic about their chances for any future friendly contact. The fact that Luco was holding the captain at gunpoint didn't help much either.

"I'd ask if you have any weapons on you, but a body like that in a suit that tight, I don't need to ask-" Luco was saying.

"Luco, stand down." Walker said angrily.

"With respect, not a chance. I'm not doing anything until I know for sure that-"

"Please, just put you gun down, and we can talk about this." The captain begged.

"Hate to break it to you, tubs, but with people we don't know who just drop out of the sky, this is how we talk," Luco sneered. "Now, if you could just-"

Luco didn't get to finish. Kahlee strode forward, shoved the barrel of his gun down and punched him flat.

"Excuse him. He missed his coffee this morning." Kahlee said, casting a withering glare at Luco as he shook his head to clear the haze the punch had left him in.

Walker started forward.

"Make sure he doesn't do anything else." He said to Kahlee before stopping in front of the captain. "You're in charge here?" He asked.

"Yes. Captain Benjamin McCrea."

"Honor to meet you, Captain. I'm Guardian Martius Walker." He held out his hand, not expecting the tentative shake that followed. "I'm sorry about Luco there. He's not too trusting of new faces." Walker said apologetically.

"Clearly." McCrea grumbled.

"I can't help but feel like we got off on the wrong foot, Captain…"

* * *

Luco sat on a rock, Kahlee keeping a close watch. He was smarting from the punch, but not physically. Did no-one else find this fishy? Find this too good to be true? Was he the only one in Team Nine that wasn't instantly trusting?

As he looked at Walker, now engaged avidly in conversation with the supposed captain, Luco had to figure that he was.

He heard a slight whirring noise off to his right. He'd been hearing it all over for a good fifteen minutes, but it sounded closer than ever. Like whatever was making it was right-

He turned and fell off his rock in surprise. A little robot was gazing at him in a curious fashion. Looking at it more closely, he recognized the model. He'd seen hundreds, maybe thousands just like it all over the remains of the city. Broken down, often missing parts.

The robot extended a hand to him.

"WALL-E." It said, a slight happiness tinting its tone.

Luco carefully put his hand out, and felt the little robot preform a fairly rough approximation of a handshake. "Uh, Luco." He said, not sure how else to respond.

"Luho?" The robot, who he now realized used its name as, well, its name, asked.

"No. Luco." Luco corrected.

"Lu-Go?" WALL-E tried again, still getting it wrong.

"No. Lu-Ko." Luco said, pronouncing it slowly and clearly, so there could be no way the robot could not get it right.

"Lugo." WALL-E said firmly, apparently deciding he got it right.

"No it's… ah, forget it. Close enough." Luco sighed in defeat.

"Making friends already, Luco?" Walker called, coming over as Kahlee picked up a conversation with the captain. Luco had been so absorbed with the robot he hadn't even noticed she'd walked off.

"You could say that." He replied.

"You're talking to a genuine hero, Luco," Walker sad. "Captain gave me the whole story. This little guy risked his life to they could get that plant," Walker pointed to the tiny plant, still being watched over by a few humans and infants, "into a scanner that would let them jump back here."

Luco gazed at WALL-E, a admiration for the little robot welling up.

"Well, how about that?" He said, tapping the lifter bot on what he assumed passed for the shoulder. WALL-E warbled something unintelligible, but it sounded modest.

* * *

Almost two hours, several introductions, and a tour of the ship later, Walker heard his pad beep. He pulled it out and turned it on.

"Val, you're not going to believe this -" He started to tell her.

"Martius, shut up and listen. You don't have much time." She interrupted.

Walker frowned. She rarely interrupted him, and she looked scared. She never looked scared. And she _never_ used his entire name.

"What's going on, Valerie?" He used her full name to let her know he was listening seriously. It was a habit the two shared.

"Team Twelve just checked in. Or rather, what's left of Team Twelve."

"'What's left of Team Twelve?'"

"They got ambushed by a warband. Last report said it was on the move."

A warband. Huge masses of Drocal soldiers, numbering a hundred strong at the very least, lead by the most powerful of warlords the surviving Drocal officers had become when the fleet was destroyed three-hundred years ago.

"How long do we have before they hit the Settlement?" Walker asked. A warband moving on the Settlement would be something that would require every Guardian to hold off. He started motioning to Kahlee and Luco, making it clear they were about to move, and move fast. "How many people can we get into shelters before-"

"Mart, you're not listening. They're not headed for the Settlement. They're headed for the ship. For you."

That gave Walker pause. A warband mobilizing for just one ship? But it was the only ship to touch down in, well, forever, he guessed. A ship of any kind rated a warband, now that he thought about it. And this ship, a ship with humanity onboard…

"Val, get the word to all the other Teams that you can. Tell them to get down here as fast as possible." Walker said, now gazing at the horizon, thinking, strategizing.

"Mart, I… I'm sorry, but you're one Team. I can't-"

"It's not us I'm asking the help for, Val. It's the people on the ship. It's the human race." Walker said.

"They're actually…?" She couldn't finish. The idea of humanity actually returning was as alien as the Drocal not trying to kill them.

"Genuine article, Val. And if a warband gets hold of them, gets hold of their ship." Walker let the sentence hang, sink in. Whatever the opinion of anyone else on humanity, the Drocal in possession of aircraft of any sort was the stuff of nightmares.

"Alright. You're right. I'll get the word out." Val said, turning and yelling something to someone offscreen that Walker didn't understand. "What are you going to do?" She asked, turning back to him.

"Hold out as long as I can." Walker replied, cutting the link.

**Well, sorry this took so long to get up. There's really no excuse for sitting on it as long as I did. **


End file.
